So the announcement that I’d been pining for came today, with Apple unveiling new products in both the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro lines. The new hotness of the top of the line 15” MacBook Pro, with Retina display, is pretty much my dream replacement for Ye Olde White MacBook. Heck, it can even be bumped up to 16 Gb of RAM with 768 Gb of SSD, for a small fee.
The 13” MacBook Airs deserve serious consideration though. First, while the Pro has slimmed down, the Airs are still 50% lighter. These days I’m extremely desirous of being leaner and meaner. The Airs can have their RAM upgraded to 8 Gb. The kicker is a 13” MacBook Air kitted out with more RAM and 512 Gb of SSD ($500, yikes!!) is still about $800 less than the equivalent 15” MacBook Pro. Obviously you get more cores, more Ghz, and more screen real estate, but $800 is 80% of the way to a Cinema Display for the desktop.
Interestingly, Apple claims the same battery life for both lines, roughly 7 hours, despite what must be a significant difference due to the Pro’s advanced display.
So serious top of the line mobile horsepower vs smaller, lighter, capable and significantly cheaper. Tough decision. I’ll wait for the in-depth nerd reviews and hold on until the 4th Macaversary.